Two powerful lobby groups in the food industry, The Grocery Manufacturers of America and the Organic Trade Association, recently intervened as friends of the court in a federal consumer class-action lawsuit accusing the nation's largest supplier of private-label organic milk of consumer fraud. In what has been described as "the largest scandal in the history of the organic industry" USDA investigators, in 2007, found that Aurora Dairy had willfully violated federal organic standards. However, industry lobbyists are now concerned that convicting Aurora will set a dangerous legal precedent. Aurora bottles private-label organic milk for Wal-Mart, Costco, Target, Safeway and many other grocery chains.

We have to invest months of hard work in planning and coalition building. - Seattle was built at the grass roots for months through educational efforts and the facilitation of creative planning by diverse groups. A coalition was built that included communities directly impacted by the WTO's actions. And it was a diffuse, decentralized coalition of affinity groups and clusters using open democratic decision-making and collective leadership. - People were trained, and trained well, in nonviolent resistance, including in the use of locks and other equipment for the creation of human barriers. The city was divided into pie slices with the WTO meeting place at the center, and different groups had the responsibility to shut down their slice of the pie. -- There is a myth that Seattle had the advantage of surprise. On the contrary, it had the advantage of extensive publicity. -- Plans were heavily publicized and, therefore, mainstreamed. Labor unions participated. Taxi drivers and longshoremen and warehouse workers went on strike. - And a great deal of energy went into art and street theater used to energize and communicate messages, as well as to block streets. People were presented with very clear and immediate reasons they should participate. -- If you think it's time we shut down the empire at the heart of the WTO with tactics so effectively used to weaken the WTO, pick up a copy of "The Battle of the Story of the Battle of Seattle" and get in touch -- and get your organizations in touch -- with this group of dedicated citizens in order to coordinate your own independent efforts to close off a pie-slice of Capitol Hill: http://peaceoftheaction.org

George W. Bush, in the duplicitous run-up to the invasion of Iraq, insulated himself, closed his mind and refused to meet with civic associations in his own land. Like an autocrat bent on plunging a country into war and occupation, knowingly on false pretenses, he deliberately deprived himself of the information that might have restrained his disastrous, messianic militarism. Disastrous, not to him and Dick Cheney, but to our country, soldiers, and economy, and to the devastated Iraqi people and their ravaged nation. -- Who would have thought last year that on assuming the presidency, that you would consider plunging deeper in to this quagmire without an exit strategy? - The deeper you plunge, the greater your rejection of the history of occupations fueling insurgencies in that region. --- The more you insulate yourself from contrary judgments to those you have been receiving from your inner councils. Our country, its people and innocent Afghan people will pay the price. -- George W. Bush, in the duplicitous run-up to the invasion of Iraq, insulated himself, closed his mind and refused to meet with civic associations in his own land. Like an autocrat bent on plunging a country into war and occupation, knowingly on false pretenses, he deliberately deprived himself of the information that might have restrained his disastrous, messianic militarism. Disastrous, not to him and Dick Cheney, but to our country, soldiers, and economy, and to the devastated Iraqi people and their ravaged nation. -- Who would have thought last year that on assuming the presidency, that you would consider plunging deeper in to this quagmire without an exit strategy? - The deeper you plunge, the greater your rejection of the history of occupations fueling insurgencies in that region. --- The more you insulate yourself from contrary judgments to those you have been receiving from your inner councils. Our country, its people and innocent Afghan people will pay the price. -- You owe the American people an un-Bush-like explanation. - Why are you not receiving these groups of American from varied backgrounds and experience at the White House on this pending Afghan decision? - They may wonder, by contrast, why you have so many White House meetings with major corporate CEOs from Wall Street, from the health insurance companies and the drug companies. - Is not the White House the peoples' House? - Along with many other citizens in our country, I look forward to your response.

Glass-Steagall stood as a firewall between commercial banks and Wall Street since 1933, when the country's leaders heeded the lessons of the 1929 stock market crash and set in place strict regulations in an attempt to prevent such an economic calamity from happening again. -- But the country's financial institutions chafed for decades under Glass-Steagall's restrictions. If only commercial banks could merge with investment banks and insurance companies, they argued, it would be so much better for the nation's economy. Gramm, who infamously insisted that the U.S. had become a nation of whiners when the economy started to tank in the fall of 2008, fought for years to repeal Glass-Steagall and finally got his way. Get government out of the way of the free marketplace, he argued, ignoring the fact that historically conservative banks would be joining the high-risk investment community and all the pitfalls it represents. --- --- U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent, has introduced legislation that would require the Treasury Department to identify the so-called "too big to fail" conglomerates and force them to break up within a year. - Meanwhile, the Madison-based Center for Media and Democracy has started a new project called BanksterUSA to rally support for Sanders' legislation and advocate for prosecution of Wall Street executives who purposely manipulated markets for their private gain. Its motto is: "Too big to fail, but not too big for jail!" More information is on its website at www.BanksterUSA.org. After what we've gone through and what millions of innocent out-of-work Americans are still going through, it truly is time to restore Glass-Steagall and rid ourselves of these "too big to fail" conglomerates.

What is needed is immediate action, not idle chatter. We already know what works: federal stimulus money channeled directly towards job creation, a public works campaign to help rebuild the U.S. crumbling infrastructure, full funding for education and social services, and more. -- Instead, Obama will invite the corporate elite to the White House to hear their advice on how to create jobs, as they continue slashing them by the thousands. The conservative Washington Post reports: “President Obama plans to bring together CEOs, small business owners and financial experts to sound out ideas for continuing to expand the economy and create jobs” (November 16, 2009). - Labor leaders have also been invited to the meeting. --- --- Allow us to save the busy President some time — it is obvious what the summit participants will suggest and why. Corporations will propose that taxes remain low for themselves and their very wealthy shareholders, while keeping regulations equally low. Both of these measures would save money for corporations, while encouraging billionaires to play more on the stock market — their solution to creating jobs. Unions, on the other hand, will demand a new and improved stimulus package. This, of course, is the only answer for workers. -- What is needed is immediate action, not idle chatter. We already know what works: federal stimulus money channeled directly towards job creation, a public works campaign to help rebuild the U.S. crumbling infrastructure, full funding for education and social services, and more. -- Instead, Obama will invite the corporate elite to the White House to hear their advice on how to create jobs, as they continue slashing them by the thousands. The conservative Washington Post reports: “President Obama plans to bring together CEOs, small business owners and financial experts to sound out ideas for continuing to expand the economy and create jobs” (November 16, 2009). Labor leaders have also been invited to the meeting. --- --- Allow us to save the busy President some time — it is obvious what the summit participants will suggest and why. Corporations will propose that taxes remain low for themselves and their very wealthy shareholders, while keeping regulations equally low. Both of these measures would save money for corporations, while encouraging billionaires to play more on the stock market — their solution to creating jobs. Unions, on the other hand, will demand a new and improved stimulus package. This, of course, is the only answer for workers. The first stimulus bill was an abysmal failure because it was far too small, while much of the money was dedicated to tax breaks. Obama is correct that it saved jobs from being destroyed and that it gave desperate states some financial relief. But the aid was far too small to be truly effective, regardless of Obama’s constant boasting about it. A new stimulus package must be much larger, and wholly dedicated to creating jobs, not merely “saving” them. The current situation in the U.S. is one of complete social failure; there is immense work that needs to be done — in infrastructure especially — while there exists millions of workers available to do the job. But nothing happens. This points to an obvious failure in the market, and thus demands serious state intervention. -- But state intervention cannot be the type that Obama has promoted thus far, especially bank bailouts and corporate-style health care. --- Instead of aiding the super-wealthy, it should be demanded that Obama drastically switch gears to curing the unemployment pandemic.

"If a majority of workers want a union, they should get a union. It's that simple. We need to stand up to the business lobby and pass the Employee Free Choice Act. That's why I've been fighting for it in the Senate and that's why I'll make it the law of the land when I'm president of the United States." --Barack Obama --- --- Nobody is making it the law of the land. Nobody is fighting for it. The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) has drifted down to the bottom of the AFL-CIO's website, buried beneath good economic proposals which, however, do nothing to build a labor movement. EFCA is not to be found anywhere on the front page of Change to Win's website at all. The media's not smearing EFCA with U.S. Chamber of Commerce lies anymore. -- Congress and the White House are silent. - Any escalation of pressure on senators from union members has never materialized, the polite letter-writing campaigns having drifted away rather than ramping up into pickets or sit-ins. --- --- It strikes me that the fundamental error in such endeavors (commissions, task forces) lies in avoiding the real goal. When you push for a living-wage law because it will benefit businesses, you can lose out to the advantages of paying poverty wages. When you push for peace because Americans die in wars, you can lose out to wars carried on by drones and mercenaries. When you reform healthcare with the goal of pleasing the insurance companies, you lose sight of actually reforming healthcare. And when you defend union organizing as good for management, you lose touch with the purpose of union organizing, namely to allow workers to have some control over their lives.

Société Générale has advised clients to be ready for a possible "global economic collapse" over the next two years, mapping a strategy of defensive investments to avoid wealth destruction. -- In a report entitled "Worst-case debt scenario", the bank's asset team said state rescue packages over the last year have merely transferred private liabilities onto sagging sovereign shoulders, creating a fresh set of problems.

Energy independence is the new creationism; nuclear power its deity. As the head glow for nuclear's new dawn, you can't do better than Aris Candris. He's president and CEO of Westinghouse Electric, the company aiming to build 14 of 25 new nuclear reactors planned in the United States. Candris also sums up everything that's wrong with the nuclear power industry's orchestrated revival-the deceptions, the manipulated numbers, the false promises and the sheer swindle of taxpayer dollars for a technology with a lethal past and an unproven future. Candris' Nov. 9 tribute to nuclear in The Wall Street Journal tells the tall tale. --- Wind and solar farms require zero raw materials to operate, and minimal security. - Terrorists aren't about to crash planes into wind turbines or solar panels. Operating a nuclear plant is said to be cheaper than operating gas- or coal-fired plants - but not when security, liability and potential catastrophes are figured into the equation. - And for all the safety advances of the past 30 years, the current fleet of about 100 reactors has a projected Chernobyl- or Three Mile Island-like severe accident rate of one every 100 years. - Would you like to live near those odds? -- Energy independence is the new creationism; nuclear power its deity. As the head glow for nuclear's new dawn, you can't do better than Aris Candris. He's president and CEO of Westinghouse Electric, the company aiming to build 14 of 25 new nuclear reactors planned in the United States. Candris also sums up everything that's wrong with the nuclear power industry's orchestrated revival-the deceptions, the manipulated numbers, the false promises and the sheer swindle of taxpayer dollars for a technology with a lethal past and an unproven future. Candris' Nov. 9 tribute to nuclear in The Wall Street Journal tells the tall tale. --- Wind and solar farms require zero raw materials to operate, and minimal security. - Terrorists aren't about to crash planes into wind turbines or solar panels. Operating a nuclear plant is said to be cheaper than operating gas- or coal-fired plants - but not when security, liability and potential catastrophes are figured into the equation. - And for all the safety advances of the past 30 years, the current fleet of about 100 reactors has a projected Chernobyl- or Three Mile Island-like severe accident rate of one every 100 years. - Would you like to live near those odds? -- The nuclear power industry can't even persuade its own investors to bet on it, so it's going after tax dollars and captive customers to pay for its dreamed-up expansion. - Simple solution: If nuclear power can make it on its own, fine. But it's far too dangerous, too uncertain, too costly and too tempting to terrorists to be subsidized by taxpayers and unwilling customers. -- So far, the nuclear power industry is betting equally and exclusively on public dollars and gullibility. - Don't let it get away with it.

Undoubtedly, the President's speechwriters are already preparing the text for his Afghan... well, we don't really know whether it will be "remarks," an announcement as part of a press conference, or a more formal address to the American people. In any case, we -- the rest of us -- have had all the disadvantages of essentially being in on the president's councils, and none of the advantages of offering our own advice. - But I don't see why we shouldn't weigh in. - Personally, I prefer not to leave the process to his speechwriters and advisors. -- What follows, then, is my version of the president's Afghan announcement. I've imagined it as a challenging prime-time address to the American people. Certainly, the subject is important enough for such an address, even if the last time Obama did this, in March, it was via an unannounced appearance on a Friday morning. So here's my President Obama -- in, I hope, something like his voice -- doing what no American president has yet done. Sit down, turn on your TV, and see what you think. Tom

The nation's economic crisis has catapulted the number of Americans who lack enough food to the highest level since the government has been keeping track, according to a new federal report, which shows that nearly 50 million people -- including almost one child in four -- struggled last year to get enough to eat. -- At a time when rising poverty, widespread unemployment and other effects of the recession have been well documented, the report released Monday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture provides the government's first detailed portrait of the toll that the faltering economy has taken on Americans' access to food. -- The magnitude of the increase in food shortages -- and, in some cases, outright hunger -- identified in the report startled even the nation's leading anti-poverty advocates, who have grown accustomed to longer lines lately at food banks and soup kitchens. - The findings also intensify pressure on the White House to fulfill a pledge to stamp out childhood hunger made by President Obama, who called the report "unsettling."

McChrystal argues that the current situation is “critical,” and that an escalation “will be decisive.” But as former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst A.J. Rossmiller says, the war is a stalemate. “The insurgency does not have the capability to defeat U.S. forces or depose Afghanistan’s central government, and…U.S. forces do not the ability to vanquish the insurgency.” - While the purported goal of the war is denying Al-Qaeda a sanctuary, according to U.S. intelligence the organization has fewer than 100 fighters in the country. And further, the Taliban’s leader, Mullah Omar, pledges that his organization will not interfere with Afghanistan’s neighbors or the West, which suggests that the insurgents have been learning about diplomacy as well. --- The Afghanistan War can only be solved by sitting all the parties down and working out a political settlement. Since the Taliban have already made a seven-point peace proposal, that hardly seems an insurmountable task. Anything else is a dangerous illusion.

As in our country, people in Europe are enraged at those hustlers of high finance who wrecked the world's economies, then flexed their political muscle to get governments to replenish their bankrupt vaults. Infuriatingly, these bailed-out bankers have now returned to business as usual, including grabbing monstrous bonus payments for themselves. -- In Europe, such greed is not only being assailed politically, but it is also being cast as a matter of fundamental moral failure. As another of Britain's leading clergymen put it, "There is a general feeling that the level of bonuses we've seen have been obscene." --- The clueless bankster clique is actually claiming that we commoners should be applauding the return of their multimillion-dollar bonus bonanzas. Why? Because, they aver, the rich payouts allow them to contribute to charity. - Such narcissism reminds me of a story about a selfish, no-good rich man who died and tried to get into heaven. - As in our country, people in Europe are enraged at those hustlers of high finance who wrecked the world's economies, then flexed their political muscle to get governments to replenish their bankrupt vaults. Infuriatingly, these bailed-out bankers have now returned to business as usual, including grabbing monstrous bonus payments for themselves. -- In Europe, such greed is not only being assailed politically, but it is also being cast as a matter of fundamental moral failure. As another of Britain's leading clergymen put it, "There is a general feeling that the level of bonuses we've seen have been obscene." --- The clueless bankster clique is actually claiming that we commoners should be applauding the return of their multimillion-dollar bonus bonanzas. Why? Because, they aver, the rich payouts allow them to contribute to charity. - Such narcissism reminds me of a story about a selfish, no-good rich man who died and tried to get into heaven. - But you can't just walk through the Pearly Gates. - An angel reviews your life, then St. Peter decides if you can enter. To counter the angel's negative review, the rich man argued that he had a history of charitable giving. He'd once tossed a nickel into a beggar's cup, he pointed out. Plus, some years later, he had aided a poor woman by giving her a nickel. Then there was the time he put a nickel into the Salvation Army kettle. --- Hearing all this, the angel turned to St. Peter and asked, "What in the world should we do with this man?" - And St. Peter said, "Give him back his 15 cents, and tell him to go to hell!"

The truth is that Obama is just carrying on the work of George W. Bush and Henry Paulson. He's trying to pry open Chinese markets to US financial services. That's the real purpose of the visit. The lavish presidential excursion has nothing to do with human rights, climate change, or dollar/yuan rebalancing. That's all just public relations mumbo-jumbo. -- Congress is in on the fraud, too. They could end China's yuan hanky-panky in minute by applying trade sanctions. But they choose not to, because Congress is a fully-owned subsidiary of Wall Street. They dare not do anything that will offend their constituents. --- Here's how the system works: China sells the US cheap lead-based widgets, and then recycles the dollars into US Treasurys and dodgy financial products. - This provides the gargantuan investment banks with a reliable flow of cheap capital to goose stocks and fatten the bottom line. Of course, the process does have it's shortcomings, like the fact that it crushes the domestic work-force, but that's how it was designed to work anyway. What economists call "unsustainable imbalances" are praised at the big brokerage houses as "windfall profits". - The total destruction of the US labor movement is just an added perk for these well-heeled, flag-waving, uber-patriots. -- The truth is that Obama is just carrying on the work of George W. Bush and Henry Paulson. He's trying to pry open Chinese markets to US financial services. That's the real purpose of the visit. The lavish presidential excursion has nothing to do with human rights, climate change, or dollar/yuan rebalancing. That's all just public relations mumbo-jumbo. -- Congress is in on the fraud, too. They could end China's yuan hanky-panky in minute by applying trade sanctions. But they choose not to, because Congress is a fully-owned subsidiary of Wall Street. They dare not do anything that will offend their constituents. --- Here's how the system works: China sells the US cheap lead-based widgets, and then recycles the dollars into US Treasurys and dodgy financial products. - This provides the gargantuan investment banks with a reliable flow of cheap capital to goose stocks and fatten the bottom line. Of course, the process does have it's shortcomings, like the fact that it crushes the domestic work-force, but that's how it was designed to work anyway. What economists call "unsustainable imbalances" are praised at the big brokerage houses as "windfall profits". - The total destruction of the US labor movement is just an added perk for these well-heeled, flag-waving, uber-patriots. -- The outsourcing of jobs, the off-shoring of businesses, and the "free trade" laws are mainly the work of cutthroat American corporatists not the "rascally Chinese" as the media would like everyone to believe. - China is not destroying America; blue-blooded, brandy-guzzling, Harvard-educated Americans are. It's just good old fashioned class warfare. --- --- Geithner and Co. see the US economy languishing in a low-grade Depression for the foreseeable future. - Thus, Wall Street is planning a major shift in its base-of-operations to Asia. This is the real reason behind Obama's trip to China. There's no truth to the rumor that US policymakers give a hoot about "currency manipulation" or the ongoing trouncing of the American worker. - China's "dollar-peg" essentially serves the interests of the giant multinational corporations and Wall Street speculators who own the media, the courts, the congress, the White House and most of the country.

Globalization has various manifestations. If viewed strictly from economic terms, then the debate delves into trade barriers, protectionism and tariffs. Powerful countries demand smaller countries to break down all trade barriers, while maintaining a level of protectionism over their own. Smaller countries, knowing that they cannot do much to hide from the hegemonic nature of globalization, form their own economic clubs, hoping to negotiate fairer deals. And the economic tug-of-war continues, between diplomacy and threats, dialogue and arm twisting. This is the side of globalization with which most of us are familiar. -- -- But there is another side of globalization, one that is similarly detrimental to some countries, and profitable to others: cultural globalization - not necessarily the domination of a specific culture, in this case Western culture, over all the rest - but rather the unbridgeable disadvantage of poorer countries, who lack the means to withstand the unmitigated takeover of their traditional ways of life by the dazzling, well-packaged and branded ‘culture’ imparted upon them around the clock. -- Globalization has various manifestations. If viewed strictly from economic terms, then the debate delves into trade barriers, protectionism and tariffs. Powerful countries demand smaller countries to break down all trade barriers, while maintaining a level of protectionism over their own. Smaller countries, knowing that they cannot do much to hide from the hegemonic nature of globalization, form their own economic clubs, hoping to negotiate fairer deals. And the economic tug-of-war continues, between diplomacy and threats, dialogue and arm twisting. This is the side of globalization with which most of us are familiar. -- -- But there is another side of globalization, one that is similarly detrimental to some countries, and profitable to others: cultural globalization - not necessarily the domination of a specific culture, in this case Western culture, over all the rest - but rather the unbridgeable disadvantage of poorer countries, who lack the means to withstand the unmitigated takeover of their traditional ways of life by the dazzling, well-packaged and branded ‘culture’ imparted upon them around the clock. -- What audiences watch, read and listen to in most countries outside the Western hemisphere is not truly Western culture in the strict definition of the term, of course. - It’s a selective brand of a culture, a reductionst presentation of art, entertainment, news, and so on, as platforms to promote ideas that would ultimately sell products. - For the dwarfed representation of Western culture, it’s all about things, tangible material values that can be obtained by that simple and final act of pulling out one’s credit card. - To sell a product, however, media also sell ideas, often one sided, and create unjustifiable fascinations with ways of life that hardly represent natural progression for many vanishing cultures and communities around the world. --- --- Globalization is not a fair game, of course. - Those with giant economies get the lion’s share of the ‘collective’ decision-making. - Those with more money and global outlook tend to have influential media, also with global outlook. In both scenarios, small countries are lost between desperately trying to negotiate a - better economic standing for themselves, while hopelessly trying to maintain their cultural identity, which defined their people, generation after generation throughout history.

Health care is a fundamental human right no different than food, shelter, clothing, clean air and water, and other essentials to life and well-being, not something to be bought and sold as a commodity. --- Universal single-payer coverage is the solution, not America's dysfunctional for-profit model. -- If Obamacare is enacted, it will cost more, deliver less, leave millions uninsured, millions more underinsured and leave a broken system in place. - It will enrich the insurance, drug and large hospital chain cartels at the expense of universal coverage. - It will solidify a class-based system delivering the best care money can buy. - Others will get sub-standard treatment, and for millions none at all. --- The solution is everybody in, nobody out under a universal, single-payer system. - No one should accept less or politicians who won't provide it.

A brutal report issued Monday by a government watchdog holds Timothy Geithner -- then the head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and now the nation's Treasury Secretary -- responsible for overpayments that put billions of extra tax dollars in the coffers of major Wall Street firms, most notably Goldman Sachs. - The authoritative new narrative describes how, while bailing out insurance giant AIG last fall, a team led by Geithner failed nearly every step of the way. - Instead of bargaining with AIG's numerous counterparties to resolve its billions of dollars in souring derivatives contracts, Geithner's team ended up paying top dollar for toxic assets -- "an amount far above their market value at the time," the report notes. - "There is no question that the effect of FRBNY's decisions -- indeed, the very design of the federal assistance to AIG -- was that tens of billions of dollars of Government money was funneled inexorably and directly to AIG's counterparties," the Office of the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program said. - Wall Street firms like Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch and Wachovia got full value for their derivatives contracts with AIG, and taxpayers got the bill. In total, $27.1 billion of public money was transferred to companies that did business with AIG. -- Throughout the bailout of AIG, the report says, the New York Fed failed to develop appropriate contingency plans; failed to properly assess the impact of its decisions; and generally engaged in negotiation strategies that were doomed to fail. -- Then, after Geithner's team paid off AIG's counterparties on Wall Street, it imposed "onerous" terms on the troubled insurer, the report says. - "The decision to acquire a controlling interest in one of the world's most complex and most troubled corporations was done with almost no independent consideration of the terms of the transaction or the impact that those terms might have on the future of AIG," the report finds.

A new book reveals how US federal prosecutors twist the law to criminalize legal activities, with connivance from the media. -- In an important new book, Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent, Boston civil-rights lawyer Harvey Silverglate argues that over the past several decades the federal government, relying on vague, dangerously elastic statutes, has criminalized a whole range of activities. The result, Silverglate contends, is that people are regularly sent to prison for crimes they hadn't even known they'd committed. - "Wrongful prosecution of innocent conduct that is twisted into a felony charge has wrecked many an innocent life and career. Whole families have been devastated, as have myriad relationships and entire companies," writes Silverglate, a friend as well as an occasional collaborator. --- Journalists, far from acting as an independent check on government, all too often are virtual collaborators in abusive law enforcement. - A new book reveals how US federal prosecutors twist the law to criminalize legal activities, with connivance from the media. -- In an important new book, Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent, Boston civil-rights lawyer Harvey Silverglate argues that over the past several decades the federal government, relying on vague, dangerously elastic statutes, has criminalized a whole range of activities. The result, Silverglate contends, is that people are regularly sent to prison for crimes they hadn't even known they'd committed. "Wrongful prosecution of innocent conduct that is twisted into a felony charge has wrecked many an innocent life and career. Whole families have been devastated, as have myriad relationships and entire companies," writes Silverglate, a friend as well as an occasional collaborator. --- Journalists, far from acting as an independent check on government, all too often are virtual collaborators in abusive law enforcement. - "Reporters are too willing to sit down with their prosecutorial sources to learn about the evil-doers in the dock, without doing the hard work of understanding why and how the government claims their conduct broke the law, or even why and how they are supposedly bad people," Silverglate writes. - The real cause of Wall Street's collapse wasn't conduct that was illegal, but, rather, conduct that was legal. - With the financial markets rebounding even as unemployment continues to rise, and with Congress shying away from even the timid reforms proposed by the Obama administration, the public is demanding the legal equivalent of blood.

During his 2008 campaign, Barack Obama promised to "Support the principle of network neutrality to preserve the benefits of open competition on the Internet." Perhaps not given a worse record than his fiercest critics feared, worse than George Bush, across the board on both domestic and foreign policies. --- Will Net Neutrality fare better? - As the last frontier of press freedom, it gives consumers access to any equipment, content, application and service, free from corporate control. - Public interest groups want it preserved. - Giant telecom and cable companies want control to: -- establish toll roads, or premium lanes; -- charge extra for speed and free and easy access; -- control content to stifle dissent and independent thought; -- co-opt this essential public space for profit; and -- subvert digital and political democracy. -- Founded in 2002, "Free Press is a national, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization working to reform the media (by) promot(ing) diverse and independent media ownership, strong public media, quality journalism, and universal access to communication." - Will Net Neutrality fare better? - As the last frontier of press freedom, it gives consumers access to any equipment, content, application and service, free from corporate control. - Public interest groups want it preserved. - Giant telecom and cable companies want control to: -- establish toll roads, or premium lanes; -- charge extra for speed and free and easy access; -- control content to stifle dissent and independent thought; -- co-opt this essential public space for profit; and -- subvert digital and political democracy. -- Founded in 2002, "Free Press is a national, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization working to reform the media (by) promot(ing) diverse and independent media ownership, strong public media, quality journalism, and universal access to communication." - It says Net Neutrality "means no discrimination (by) prevent(ing) Internet providers from blocking, speeding up or slowing down Web content based on its source, ownership or destination." - Giant providers want it privatized to "discriminate in favor of their own search engines (while) slowing down or blocking services by their competitors. (They're) spending hundreds of millions of dollars lobbying Congress" and the FCC to defeat Net Neutrality and jeopardize the Internet's future. - Its loss will stifle innovation, limit competition, and control, restrict or prevent free access to information. - "Consumer choice and the free market would be sacrificed to the interests of a few corporations." - The Internet will resemble cable TV with providers deciding "which channels, content and applications are available," and at what price. --- At stake is whether digital democracy or corporate control will prevail.

Residents of the C Street Christian fellowship house will no longer benefit from a loophole that had allowed the house's owners to avoid paying property taxes.

It's been 10 years since Washington repealed the Glass-Steagall Act, the moment we got royally screwed by the banking system -- and we're still paying the price.